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originally posted by: eriktheawful
Another idea: 1000 years ago, that system 50 ly away was using radio....then, for whatever reason, they all died out. Again: we'd have missed their RF emissions.
originally posted by: Blue Shift
Yeah, the biggest problem still seems to be that we're expecting to find aliens that conform to and live within the reality that we have defined for ourselves, given our very limited senses and intelligence. That's just dandy for maybe finding aliens who are like us (so far, no good), but it's not going to help us find or recognize aliens that are way smarter than us, or exist in a kind of reality we just don't have the senses and brains to comprehend.
originally posted by: eriktheawful
a reply to: AugustusMasonicus
Yah, Rare Earth has two major sub categories:
1) Planets that can have life.
2) Planets that can have life, and it evolves into tool using intelligence.
I'll cover both in different threads.
I remember the look on a friend's face when we were talking about this one day. He stated:
"But every star has a goldilocks zone, it's just in a different place depending on the star."
My response was: "Yah....but not every star always has a planet that formed there in that zone."
The look on his face was priceless, as though it never occurred to him that a star might only have planets too close or too far.
There are SO many different things that can be talked about. Over the years I've been surprised at the lack of discussion on this in any depth here on ATS.
originally posted by: eriktheawful
It can be some thought provoking things. I mean, if we include all the possible Earth Like planets in the universe itself, the odds are staggering that it would happen over and over.
But if you limit it to just one galaxy, ours.........the odds are worse than winning the lottery.
1) Rare Earth: Planets that can not only sustain life, but develop intelligent life are so rare that most galaxies do not have even one planet like this. This category covers a HUGE range of reasons for this, but does not exclude planets where alien life did develop, just that they did not develop "intelligent tool using" life.
2) They Exist But Do Not Communicate: This category is for solutions that says sure, there are plenty of intelligent aliens out there, but for one reason or another they either do not communicate, or we can not see/hear them.
3) The age of many of these stars are older than our own stars, giving plenty of time for other life to arise.
4) Considering the age of the universe, even if a trip to our planet took millions of years, there has been enough time for them to get here.
5) They Have Existed But Always Kill Themselves Off: this is the Doomsday category, in which the idea is that alien civilizations do develop and advance, but always seem to end up ending themselves one way or another.
6) The Universe Kills Them All Off: This again is another category where they do exist, but the universe is a dangerous place and at some point, every alien civilization's number is up at some point and their luck runs out.
originally posted by: Blue Shift
originally posted by: eriktheawful
It can be some thought provoking things. I mean, if we include all the possible Earth Like planets in the universe itself, the odds are staggering that it would happen over and over.
But if you limit it to just one galaxy, ours.........the odds are worse than winning the lottery.
Yeah, but as I've also said before, maybe there are millions or billions of civilizations out there, but they're just so far away that we'll never have any contact with them or even find the slightest trace of evidence for them, and vice-versa. And in that case, even though they might technically "exist," to us they'll always be hypothetical. Which on a practical level is essentially the same as them being fictional. Can something exist if we don't have any evidence of it -- direct, secondary, inferred, circumstantial?
originally posted by: dragonridr
The biggest problem is if only one or two lifeforms in a galaxy the possibility of meeting another goes to near zero.
originally posted by: GenerationGap
I'd like to add a 7th potential, and I believe most likely answer:
7) They are here, and we are them.
originally posted by: GenerationGap
7) They are here, and we are them.
4) They Are Here and Do Exist: This is where most of the conspiracy theorist will thrive, that they are here, meddling with us humans, but we're too stupid to notice, or it's been hidden too well from us.
originally posted by: Vratyas
Im not a physicist (i wish i where -.-) but i always ask myself if nuclear explosions in space are detectable from outside our solarsystem..
en.m.wikipedia.org...
They leave some artificial particles in space that are not naturaly..
So if they detect this unnatural particles they would know that there is a (dangerous) intelligent species out there..
But like im told ya above, im not a physicist